One of the most exciting and coolest companies I discovered in my pre-NYCC research and then further at the show was Redbubble. Since the show I’ve been tracking the site when I can finding designs that truly struck my fancy and I thought would make cool T-shirts or stickers to own or in the very least wallpapers for my computer.

Redbubble is an absolutely awesome art community site,much like Flickr, Deviantart, and even Threadless, but has its own special vibe & design style that truly makes it stand out. Founded in 2006 by three artists & writers to help create a new marketplace for creative visual artists of all realms, the company has grown to feature over 200 thousand plus artists and help assist in over one million orders in nine million products ranging from shirts, stickers, iPhone cases, prints, calendars and full expanding branding for artists to stamp their visions on and see profit for their creations.

Working with various different companies to get the items printed everything is of high quality which I experienced first hand through a totebag, various stickers and a logoed shirt which have all come in very handy and have stood up to regular use.

The easiest and most exciting thing on Redbubble is its very intelligent alogorithm search engines and suggestions of new best work to find art you really love. I’ll be sharing some of that at the end, basically in my own preference, but I want to publicly thank Peter Tomassi and the entire staff at Redbubble. At NYCC they proved they don’t just run an excellent site, but can run an awesome convention booth experience. This was the first year they had brought product to the show for sale and their success blew me away. They really tried to cater to the current pop-culture fan with shirts ranging from TV, to movies, to comics, video games and basic nerd language. The booth itself was really set up greatly and the workers were totally sweet.

My favorite type of images to find on Redbubble have been the ones that mashup a popular concept with something you wouldn’t expect or that just looks at the character, person, pop culture phenom in a new way that really catches the eye. It could be a movie, cartoon, professional wrestling, TV show, actor, it doesn’t really matter, I just really like images that switch things up. There are few artists I’ve found on the site who I really like such as Lapuss and Leigh Wortley. Here’s three images I really liked on Redbubble, the first is New Mutant’s Warlock and Cyber in Calvin & Hobbes style by Leigh, the second is Fozzie Bear as Clockwork Orange’s Alex by Chris Wahl and the last is Showtime’s Dexter if it was a 1940’s WB Cartoon by Lapuss.

All three of these are available as shirts or stickers. I haven’t personally decided what to get or to get all three or to get everything on the site. It’s that awesome.

I had many panels laid out for myself to hit, but I also knew that I also had press sessions this day and Saturday, so anytime not in one of those would be the only time I would have to actually be on the show floor itself, so I took advantage of that and hit the floor hard.

This meant visiting The Block and checking out vinyl toys and one off exclusives I couldn’t even begin to think of buying, but I took my share of photos and had conversations. Got a sketch from Australia’s Sekure D which was pretty sweet. I really liked Ron English‘s big statues he made to have shown off at the show as well. What was really sweet was seeing some of the art fromSpoke Art, especially the work from there Wes Anderson art show Bad Dads, where they had prints from both this last year and this year’s show.

The Block is next to where all the super expensive autographing of wrestlers, playboy bunnies and pornstars who aren’t actually guests of the con are located, so I got to see Brutus Beefcake, Tito Santana, and Greg Valentine whoring themselves across the aisle from the real Delorean and 1960’s Batmobile with a fake Marty McFly. Nearby was Shifty Look who had an old school arcade set up which was pretty cool. This was near the Podcast arena where I got to say hello to Keith R.A. DeCandido and next to him The Chronic Rift‘s John S. Drew who I haven’t met in person before but have talked to online. I also stopped in the Fandom Dating booth and got to talk to the site’s runner/owner. I had a feeling I wouldn’t make it to Sci-Fi Speed Dating during the show so at least being registered on that site might make something happen, although I’ve gotten two totally Spam or just “Really? Why would I respond to you?” things from it and the one person who caught my interest responded with such a blah response I didn’t follow up. The sites still in beta though and the NYCC was a big part of building the site, so we shall see.

My interview session withRed Bubble was rescheduled through txts while walking the floor so I made my way over to their booth. It was completely a thrill to learn more about the site and this is another one of my specific articles coming up with pictures and more, so I won’t say more now.

I had a little time to kill at this point and also bumped into a few friends on the floor just walking around, so I took advantage of this fact. I made my second purchase of the show around this time inTHEY LIVE Collector’s Edition Blu-Ray. Shout Factory, the distributors had it available for $25 and almost a month before release to retail so I just grabbed it since it’s something I’d buy in stores eventually anyways. After this I made my way over to Artist’s Alley for my first of two trips as there was lots of aisles in Artist’s Alley in the very large North Pavilion. While there I got to at least say hello to my good friend Laura Lee Gulledge and become a member of the Molly Danger fan club, Jamal Igle’s awesome project he’s working on.

Somewhere in this time I also made it over to Scott C.’s table in Autographing to pick up his new book The Great Showdowns, which would be purchase three of four, for those counting along. I had worn my Double Fine Adventure shirt specifically hoping a few folks would notice, but mostly Scott. I asked him to draw rejected versions of the two protagonists from the still codenamed REDS in a showdown inside the book.

The most exciting time I had on the schedule for the day though was getting to sit with Mary Lynn Rajskub, Hank Harris and Jamie Clayton, the cast of the transmedia program on rides.tv from Fourth Wall, DIRTY WORK. It was great to sit down with them and discuss working on the show, some behind the scenes and questions that haven’t really been covered, but mostly it was the meeting them that was most awesome and now having an excuse to promote the show even more than I was doing so before. I want more episodes and so does the cast, they really seemed to enjoy being part of this production.

After the press room I had a few hours to kill till I had to get my opportunity to interview Nick Kroll, so back to Artist’s Alley to try and finish it up knowing that I might not get back there Saturday or Sunday. I saw a couple of Cosplay’s that really caught my eye, most notably BATTLE POPE. I also made my final purchase, number four if you forgot from a few paragraphs above. It was the collected edition of ACE KILROY Volume One. When the collection first appeared on Kickstarter it really caught my notice, but at pledge rate it was going to run $40, a bit rich for my blood at the time. I am very happy and feel fortunate that the guy’s had a very successful Kickstarter (200% funded) and that the collection was at the table for $10. I snatched that right up! Can’t wait to sit down and read it.

Finally I headed back to the Press Room area which was located in the back of the Que Hall C used for letting folks into the building in the morning and the IGN theater after that. It’s what feels like a three block walk on paved concrete designed for cars and planes, not feet. That press ran a bit long, ending up at a table that was next to last in 15 minute roundtables. Yet I had lots of fun and got a great video which also features John C. Daly and executive producer John Levenstein.

It was more floor walking after till I decided to check out Scott C.’s Unbound stage talk where he went into further details behind the history of The Great Showdowns. The highlight of it all though was that during the Q & A Scott draw the questioners portraits. Yes, that means I have a quick sketch portrait of myself by Scott C. It’s a big large though, done on 11 X 17 paper.

I went over to theTitmouse panel after this and had gone to try and get some giveaways (I only wanted the coloring book actually), but as I was sitting there watching the sizzle reel I remembered that there was a Bravest Warriors/Superfuckers party down at Jim Hanley’s and so I rushed down there and while I was late, Nate, marketing director at Frederator had them reloop the Bravest Warriors episode, which ended up being the full version, which is not what was shown the next day at the panel. I also got some awesome buttons. If you aren’t subscribed to Cartoon Hangover, go do so now! Also, at the Titmouse panel I did at least discover that this awesome music video directed by Mike Judge of Zac Brown Band animated by Titmouse existed.